Inflammation is the complex biological response of tissues to harmful stimuli, such as pathogens, damaged cells, or irritants. It is generally a protective attempt by the organism to remove the injurious stimuli as well as initiate the healing process for the tissue. However, non-appropriately regulated inflammation can lead to several diseases irrespective of the age of the subject.
Ageing is often associated with a dysregulation of the immune system, such as a noted decline in cell-mediated immune response concomitant with an increased humoral immune dysfunction (e.g. lower response to vaccine). Ageing is furthermore often associated with a status of low-grade inflammation. Consequently, in particular many elderly subjects are at increased risk of infectious and non-infectious diseases that contribute to morbidity and mortality.
Unwanted inflammation can be treated by proper medication. However, medication may always result in unwanted side effects and often requires the supervision of medical personnel. Consequently, there is a need in the art for compositions that can be administered—preferably on a day-to-day basis—without unwanted side effects and without the need to consult a doctor and that can be used to treat or prevent inflammation.
One way to achieve this object is to administer a food composition comprising probiotics.
Probiotic micro-organisms are known to have a beneficial effect on the health and well-being of the host. In the last few decades, the use of probiotic bacteria has gained considerable attention as a safe and accessible form of treatment for example for gastrointestinal diseases (Isolauri E, et al., Dig Dis Sci 1994, 39:2595-2600). Typical probiotic bacteria that have been employed in this respect belong to the Lactobacillus or the Bifidobacterium genus.
The effectiveness of probiotics depends, in part, on their ability to resist to digestive tract conditions and adhere to intestinal epithelium. Moreover, a critical aspect conditioning their potential benefit to the host is the probiotic cross-talk with the host's environment and their impact on epithelium barrier and its function.
While some probiotics already achieve very respectable result in terms of colonization of the gastrointestinal tract and interaction with the host, it would be desirable to have available a tool to further improve the effectiveness with which the probiotic micro-organisms colonize the gut and interact with the host.